Tinnakill Castle (in Ruins) — Report the wrong picture

What is recorded here

Tinnakill Castle stands as a four-storey limestone ruin in flat Laois countryside, its thick walls and groin vault dating from the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century. The structure features mural stairs, garderobes, and finely dressed quoins that mark it as a substantial tower house rather than a humble farmhouse. A sheela-na-gig once taken from the site still carries the memory of its strange guardianship, while the empty chambers suggest rooms where people lived, argued, and watched the horizon before decay claimed them.

Situated in flat countryside on slightly elevated site. A four-storey high tower house (max. dims 10m NE-SW, 11.80m NW-SE, wall T 2.35m) built of roughly coursed limestone. Punch-dressed limestone blocks with finely dressed margins used as quoins and in windows and doorway indicating a late sixteenth or early seventeenth century date. There is a groin vault over second-floor level, other floors were of wood. Garderobes in NE angle, mural passage in SW wall, mural stairs in SW and SE walls. Sheela-na-gig (LA008-001002-) said to have come from here (JKAS 1904, Vol. IV, 205-15; JKAS 1920, Vol. IX, 262-3). The above description is derived from the published 'Archaeological Inventory of County Laois' (Dublin Stationery Office, 1995) compiled by P. David Sweetman, Olive Alcock and Bernie Moran. In certain instances the entries have been revised and updated in the light of recent research. Date of upload: 17 December 2007

Tinnakill Castle was built in the late 16th or early 17th century by a member of the MacMahon family, who were prominent Gaelic lords in the area. The castle is remembered as a significant example of a high-status tower house in the region, reflecting the power and influence of the local Gaelic aristocracy before the Flight of the Earls.

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